


Racing Heart

by cortchuzska



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-23
Updated: 2013-06-23
Packaged: 2017-12-15 22:57:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,157
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/854955
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cortchuzska/pseuds/cortchuzska
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>AU, sixties, Provence. The Tyrells own an leading fragrance company (guess why... ), the Martells are into oil business (maybe stretched, but they call for desert). Sorry if I studded it with too many French clichés, but to me Oberyn has a French brilliance about him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Racing Heart

His brother's one was the best kept unsecret of jet set and car-racing both; his sister held firmly the under-twenty record of short lived marriages, according to Paris-Match; it fell on him to carry on the family name and produce a heir.

It was Willas running the Tyrells' daily business from his wheelchair, occasionally helped, when it came to mending his father's worst blunders, by his grandmother Olenna, who as a young widow had saved single-handedly a formerly flourishing family company from the bankruptcy where her beloved husband's unconscionable flights of fancy had plunged it.

Still, Loras even got an offer by Jaime Lannister about joining his F1 team, and had fulfilled his father's ambition, in his days a no more than average rally racer, whose only placing of note was a third in the 1000 Lakes Rally, courtesy of his co-driver and now right-hand man Randyll Tarly, and Margaery had been daddy's girl from her first coy gurgle, and they were always praised and forgiven everything.

So Willas never openly refused: his condition spared him from attending parties and social events, his only hobbies were dusty books and his telescope, and for once being forced to a wheelchair turned into the bonus of being used to sit still for long. Entertainments not much appealing to most girls, and even if from time to time some made it to his wheelchair, he just would let it drop. Social climbers, most of them, digging him as their would-be pot of gold, with the odd Margaery's friend under a sudden spell of pity, looking for a charity case. The last one had been Sansa Stark, a pitiful case herself, ripped of everything by her father's partners. Her only asset left was his name, whose very traditional yet bold Brit flair would neatly fit their growth plans afoot, as grandmother had put it, while going over the drawings of a perfume bottle gunmetal stopper, shaped like a wolf-head and purposefully similar to the radiator cap of a once glorious car brand. Willas felt pitied but for a change pitied her too, and had been very close to fancy her as his wife, before considering a marriage based on pity only would be a pitiful thing in itself. She had got her fair share of delusions, and he would not saddle her with a cripple and a lie.

For there was one who made his pulse race, and he was the one who had no reason to and would never pity him, and would brush off any responsibility in the crash that had costed Willas the use of his legs. He could not remember much of the accident, only the increasing speed and the screech of the latest and fastest Ducati motorcycle his overproud father would let him ride before he had reached the age for a driving licence, and wondering why write 'Red Viper' on a bike tank when a fearsome black one was emblazoned on it. Willas later learned its true story: a Far Eastern good luck symbol, he hinted offhandedly at some time there during Indochina War; at first he got it painted it in the right colour, but turned it from sanguine to sable after a sister's death he seldom spoke of, when he had no longer reasons to believe in luck, and over time it grew to the mark of a reputation shady at best, tainted with open scandals and darker rumours.

Yet, it was him who set up a private flight and promptly fetched from a medical conference to Willas's bedside doctor Caleotte, who was treating his own brother from a rare and painful bone affliction, and professor Qyburn, speaker at the same congress. Promptly though pointlessly, for nor the two of them, nor the many others to follow could do much.

And when his phone rings in the dead of night, his heart pace quickens, for it can only be _him_ , from some hellish spot in the middle of nowhere. He almost got a degree in geology, even if his true passion was biochemistry, or medieval history, or something else for his tales never tally and every time take a different turn, and now he is carries out oil explorations on his brother's behalf. Or his lengthy wonderful letters, for oil has an uncanny liking to unlikely places and forlorn deserts, days of rough jeep track from the nearest phone. Whenever Willas takes refuge in a most discreet health centre, more from his family than because of his legs, he will find a way to snatch some time together, and wild days are to follow, and even more epic nights.

He would not pity him, and was not in him to be kind, nor did he care for his feelings, not even restrained himself from pursuing other affairs; actually, he made no mystery Willas was just a casual relationship among his many, a mere outlet to his lust. Yet Willas couldn't care less, for he never felt so alive, as when Oberyn Martell was about.

Thanks to him, Willas got 'a sniff of woman', even if it was not really worth it, but far from the awful embarrassing botch he had figured, and Oberyn had driven madly through the hairpins from Monaco – thanks to a breathtaking drive along the Verdon gorge, penned in a motorcycle sidecar Willas knew dreadfully well where madly scored on Oberyn Martell's scale – to bring him timely his birthday present, a lovely brunette and the best professional still in business on both the Med's shores – blondes were not much to his liking and no wonder the loveliest and no longer working girl was his own mistress, and added that women were really wasted on him. Willas countered for a certainty Oberyn had and would enjoy same gift thoroughly, smooth skin and soft hair and everything a woman should be, and he replied with a shrug that as a rule of thumb he liked them best, for if you had to, you'd better pick the most different from yourself, if only for variety sake. Willas was not sure whether he meant gender or person, not a slim chance Oberyn Martell would ever keep himself to one only anyway, for the closest thing to faithfulness he could contemplate was a threesome, but this time he was even glad of it, because by the end Oberyn made it worthwhile nonetheless. All in all it, the best birthday Willas had lived from long, since his father had gifted him his first kart and allowed him to hold baby Margaery and he had felt almost a man grown and so proud of having a little sister, and now he felt like a boy again, so he broke into a peal of laughter, and laughter becomes you, little rose, really you ought to laugh more often.

More often than they would ever believe, Willas Tyrell pities them all, for not even knowing what passion truly is.


End file.
